San Francisco’s increase in coronavirus infections and hospitalizations for COVID-19 has slowed, but a new rise could occur in mid-January due to holidays, the city’s director of public health said Tuesday.
Dr Grant Colfax, the health director, said at a news conference that hospitals in the city now have enough available beds in their intensive care units, although the available space in the whole area has dropped to 5.9% of capacity.
“We remain in a serious and critical position, but our collective action makes a difference,” Colfax said.
The rate of increase in infections ‘seems to be declining’, Colfax said, but it is ‘plausible’ that the city ‘will see a sharp increase in the next few weeks’.
Colfax began his remarks by expressing support for residents of Southern California and the Central Valley, in regions he said are “dire” and “catastrophic” pandemic conditions.
He said San Francisco hospitals now have four COVID-19 patients from outside the city, and that more patients from other regions may be short of intensive care beds.
The state Department of Public Health awards the vaccines to health care providers, who then receive the doses directly from the vaccine manufacturers, Colfax said. The vaccines will be distributed according to priorities set by the state.
San Francisco has not yet detected a new, possibly more contagious strain of the virus that has spread rapidly in Britain and has been found in the United States, including Southern California.
Colfax said he would not be surprised, however, if the tension was finally discovered in the city or elsewhere in the Bay.
The city’s public health department has so far vaccinated more than 6,000 people, mostly prominent health workers at city-run health facilities, including Laguna Honda Hospital, one of the largest competent nursing homes in the country.
By the end of Tuesday, Colfax said more than 90% of Laguna Honda residents had received their first dose of the vaccine. Fifteen residents and 34 staff members at Laguna Honda were diagnosed with COVID-19.
The city has not found an excess of vaccinations, Colfax said.
“Right now, demand weighs heavier than supply,” he said.
About 80,000 people living or working in San Francisco will be vaccinated during the first round of distribution, he said.
“Please know,” he added, “we expect everyone who wants the vaccine to finally get it.”
Mayor London Breed, who also spoke at the news conference, stressed that residents should have hope.
“The vaccine is here,” she said. “These are difficult times, but there is light at the end of the tunnel.”